23 Apr 2014

North Korean state news agency abuses UN official for being gay

A North Korean state news agency has resorted to anti-gay abuse of a UN official for criticizing the communist state's human rights record.

The Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) took to attacking Michael Kirby, chairperson of the Commission of Inquiry into Human Rights in North Korea, by calling him a “disgusting old lecher with a 40-odd-year-long career of homosexuality.”

Titled “KCNA Commentary Slams Artifice by Political Swindlers,” the editorial said Kirby’s speech to the UN Security Council April 17 was a “last-ditch effort intended to lend credence to the ‘report’ peppered with fabrications and create an atmosphere of international pressure”  on North Korea

It accused Kirby, a former justice of the High Court of Australia, of taking the lead in “cooking the report” — a 372-page document condemning Kim Jong-un’s regime and human rights abuses.

“He is now over seventy, but he is still anxious to get married to his homosexual partner” said the editorial.

“In fact, it is ridiculous for such gay to sponsor dealing with others’ human rights issue,” it added.

Officially, homosexuality doesn’t exist in North Korea, and the country has no known laws banning it.

“This practice can never be found” in North Korea “boasting of the sound mentality and good morals,” the report said adding that “homosexuality has become a target of public criticism even in Western countries too.”

The report’s abuse of Kirby was primarily directed for his presentation to the Security Council where he advised the UN to refer North Korea to the International Criminal Court for persecution of government officials.

“Lurking behind it is a dishonest and political purpose of the U.S. and its followers seeking to undermine the ideology and social system” of  North Korea the report said, especially now that it had “no way out over the nuclear issue.”

“After all, such political swindlers as Kirby were mobilized so as to internationalize the nonexistent human rights issue” of North Korea, it said.

It then went on to personally attack the former judge’s relationship with his partner of 40 years.

NK News – an outlet devoted to developments in the communist state that secludes itself from the outside world – claims that it the first time that the agency has attempted to discredit someone based on their sexuality and also the first time it directly referred to homosexuality.

North Korean propaganda is well-known for its abuse of foreign dignitaries. Earlier this month, the state newspaper Rodong Sinmun called South Korean President Park Geun-hye a “bitch” for remaining a spinster and not having children.

Korea (North)